Talk by Stuart Dunn at the PRATT and King's College London's Symposium: "Can Scholarship Show as well as Tell"

1. Illustrating Object Biographies
Dr. StuartDunn
stuart.dunn@kcl.ac.uk
@StuartDunnCeRch

2. The notion of biography is one that leads us to think comparatively
about the accumulation of meaning in objects and the changing
effects these have on people and events. This central thread of
comparison however makes the variety od relationships between
people and things in different cultural contexts even more apparent.
Gosden C. and Y. Marshall. 1999
Object biographies

3. Image source:
http://web.prm.ox.ac.uk/rpr/index.php/objectbiographies/

4. 4

5. Chaîne opératoire
Chaîne opératoire André Leroi-Gourhan, 2006

6. 6
• ‘Life history’ approach
• Biographical approach

7. 7
• Static objects (e.g.
monuments, buildings)
• Moveable objects (e.g.
artefacts)

8. Cretan
Late Minoan
Late Minoan IB
Marine Style
Octopus
Date – more ambiguous
LBA – ca. 1500-1450 BC
Pilgrim flask
Repair history
Palaikastro

9. 9
Iconic images…

10. 10

11. 11

12. 12
Image source: Frank Anderson, https://www.flickr.com

13. 13
Image source: www.heraclitanfire.net
“The Sacred Made Real”

14. “Digital repatriation”
Image source: http://www.mhm.ucl.ac.uk/mhm-research/western-
solomon-islands-war-canoe.php

15. 15
Image source: http://www.mlahanas.de/Greeks/LX/ElginMarbles.html
The Parthenon

16. 16
The Parthenon

17. 17
The Parthenon

18. 18
Image source: W. St Clair, ‘Lord Elgin and the Marbles’, 1998

19. 19
Image source: W. St Clair, ‘Lord Elgin and the Marbles’, 1998

20. Images = objects = connections

21. 21
Biography of a bridgehead

23. 23

28. 28
Some conclusions
Object biography can allow us to think in greater
depth about objects…
…BUT they implicitly enforce textual
narrative structures…
..SO imagery is essential…
…BUT ONLY IF IT IS
PUBLISHED DIGITALLY!